Especially from the perspective of a UK citizen living in Europe, this sabbati horribilis has been so embarrassing and depressing as the shambles of the Conservative Party conference took place in Birmingham.
The Foreign Secretary, Jeremy Hunt, compares the European Union to a Soviet prison. Boris Johnson is photographed running through a field of wheat in order to mock the prime minister he is openly betraying.
To crown it all, yesterday we had Theresa May literally dancing on to the stage at the party conference to Abba’s “Dancing Queen.” So was wie peinlich! Quite apart from the fact that Theresa May had to resort to a European, non-British pop song for her cringe-worthy entrance, she chose the wrong one. Abba’s “SOS” would have course been far more appropriate, especially the opening lines: “Where are those happy days, they seem so hard to find, I tried to reach for you, but you have closed your mind …”
All Mrs May could do during her speech was to reflect on the past, to knock her political opponents and to make false promises about there being no further austerity after Brexit. There was no vision, no new policies that would help to move the nation forward, and no movement in her flawed Chequers plan that is splitting her party, the UK and the EU. Yet she boldly claimed, “Let’s say it loud and clear: Conservatives will always stand up for a politics that unites us rather than divides us.”
Can she seriously believe this nonsense? Given a solitary year of majority government for the first time in a quarter of a century, the Conservatives gave the nation the most divisive event that has happened to it in four hundred years, from which it remains entirely unclear how it is meant to recover.
Mrs May also proudly reminded us that the Conservative party “will put into place a new immigration system that will allow businesses and universities to attract the brightest and best to the UK” whilst ensuring that all low-skilled workers from the European Union and elsewhere will be banned from setting foot on the sinking island.
How ironic and hypocritical, therefore, were Mrs May’s comments about the Conservatives being the only party to give opportunities to the nation. “To dream, and strive, and achieve a better life,” she said. “To know that if your dad arrived on a plane from Pakistan, you can become home secretary.”
Sajid Javid’s dad, an unskilled migrant who worked on the buses, would never be allowed into Britain under the new immigration policies proposed by Theresa May!
Her understanding of democracy is even more nefarious than her understanding of citizenship (see quotation below).
She dismissed talk of a second referendum, which “wouldn’t be a people’s vote, it would be a politicians’ vote, telling people they got it wrong the first time.”
In reality of course, a second referendum would be the people passing verdict on how the politicians have got on with handling the first people’s vote. And that means her. The current numbers suggest that that verdict would be damning. No wonder she can’t uphold what would amount to true democracy.
Ah, well, to my consolation, yesterday, “Der Tag der deutschen Einheit” (German Unity Day), I finally completed my application for German citizenship. Not because I am worried about the personal consequences of a predictably awful Brexit, but because I am ashamed to remain British.
“If you believe you are a citizen of the world, you are a citizen of nowhere. You don’t understand what citizenship means.” Theresa May.